title: Modeling the mechanical response of in vivo human skin under a rich set of deformations.
abstract: Determining the mechanical properties of an individual's skin is important in the fields of pathology, biomedical device design, and plastic surgery. To address this need, we present a finite element model that simulates the skin of the anterior forearm and posterior upper arm under a rich set of three-dimensional deformations. We investigated the suitability of the Ogden and Tong and Fung strain energy functions along with a quasi-linear viscoelastic law. Using non-linear optimization techniques, we found material parameters and in vivo pre-stresses for different volunteers. The model simulated the experiments with errors-of-fit ranging from 13.7 to 21.5%. Pre-stresses ranging from 28 to 92 kPa were estimated. We show that using only in-plane experimental data in the parameter optimization results in a poor prediction of the out-of-plane response. The identifiability of the model parameters, which are evaluated using different determinability criteria, improves by increasing the number of deformation orientations in the experiments.
authors.affiliation: Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z4, Canada. flynn.cormac@gmail.com
authors.forename: Cormac
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Flynn
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Taberner
authors.forename: Poul
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Nielsen
mesh_terms: D019245:Compressive Strength / Q000502:physiology; D003198:Computer Simulation; D055119:Elastic Modulus / Q000502:physiology; D006244:Hardness / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D008954:Models, Biological; D012879:Skin Physiological Phenomena; D013314:Stress, Mechanical